Canadians need to do more to reduce their growing waistlines, but the country may not be ready for tough measures and legislation to help shrink the nation, according to the chief public health officer.

First comes the scare-mongering...

"The concern with the increasing rates of obesity is that this may in fact, be the first generation of children to not live as long and healthy as their parents," said Butler-Jones in an interview.

Governments over the years, have passed various pieces of legislation designed to reduce smoking, including increased taxation and packaging requirements, and some health experts have been pushing for similar initiatives to combat obesity.

Proposals include banning the advertising of unhealthy foods, increasing taxes on food that isn't nutritious, subsidizing fruits and vegetables to make them more affordable for Canadians and forcing the food industry to change its labelling, packaging and ingredients.

Does anyone seriously dispute that the slippery slope is real, or that this was not always the next 'logical step'?

Life expectancy reports are usually obtained via the UN and the WHO. So, we're led to believe that people in communist Cuba have a longer lifespan than people in the US or UK.

Communist nations have a nasty tendency to lie a lot.

Filmmaker Michael Moore made a movie a couple of years ago where he sold the idea that health care delivery is better in Cuba.

Well, here's a site from Cuban refugees that paints a very different picture.

http://www.therealcuba.com/

Most people die when they are either very young or very old. On the young end of spectrum, even Western nations have different standards for applying infant mortality. This factors into the life expectancy discrepancies between nations.

About Me

Writer and researcher at the Institute of Economic Affairs. Blogging in a personal capacity.
Author of Selfishness, Greed and Capitalism (2015), The Art of Suppression (2011), The Spirit Level Delusion (2010) and Velvet Glove, Iron Fist (2009).

"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience."